The Elks Financial Reporting System or (FRS) is designed to both enhance and simplify ... ·...
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The Elks Financial Reporting System or (FRS) is designed to both enhance and simplify local lodge financial reporting, and will replace the Annual Financial Report for all participating lodges. The new system - is to be employed by all lodges no later than April 1, 2020 but it will not replace 990 or 990T submissions to the IRS , nor will it replace an audit or review if required by your state based on other factors or circumstances. In addition, your Grand Lodge Sponsor may still require a review or audit if there are concerns raised by the data in the FRS.
Transcript of The Elks Financial Reporting System or (FRS) is designed to both enhance and simplify ... ·...
The Elks Financial Reporting System or (FRS) is designed to both enhance and simplify local lodge financial reporting, and will replace the Annual Financial Report for all participating lodges. The new system - is to be employed by all lodges no later than April 1, 2020 but it will not replace 990 or 990T submissions to the IRS, nor will it replace an audit or review if required by your state based on other factors or circumstances. In addition, your Grand Lodge Sponsor may still require a review or audit if there are concerns raised by the data in the FRS.
This PowerPoint presentation is designed to help Lodge’s to better understand how to use the COA’s (Chart of Accounts), Actuals, and Budgets and how to submit them to Adaptive. The Actuals and budgets have to be submitted to Adaptive in certain formats which will be explained further in this presentation.
• There will be an annual charge from the Grand Lodge. It will be $165 per year and will be billed to all the Lodges in March each year.
• Each individual Lodge’s Chart of Accounts will be required to match the Grand Lodge’s Chart of Accounts.
• Lodge can have any number of sub-accounts as long as the Chart of Accounts matches the Grand Lodge’s Uniform Chart of Accounts and the sub-accounts have to have 7 characters. The preferred is 3001001through 3031099.
Presenter
Presentation Notes
I have seen some lodges that prefer to use the (.) or (-). The 01/0A is preferred as there can be more sub accounts if meeded
• Then Monthly updates of the full individual lodge’s Chart of Accounts information will be provided directly to the Adaptive database each month. This will be done by creating a data file in an Excel file formatted in a Comma separated Value (CSV) worksheet and emailing it to [email protected] .
• The data file contains the Chart of Account information for the previous month.• Adaptive Insights will be responsible for updating the new system with the Lodge
info that was emailed to them.• If a previous month needs to be changed, that update can be sent to Adaptive
Insights at any time with the appropriate dating.
• There will be a penalty assessed from the Grand Lodge for late updates…. Non-Compliance with FRS may result in a penalty of $100 per month for each month late
• If Lodge’s want to see the information in the new system, their District Deputy or FRS coordinator can produce the chosen report and can e-mail it to the Lodge as a PDF or Excel file (unless the Lodge has viewing privileges). Viewing privileges cost the Lodge $380 a year for access. For viewer access you will need to contact the FRS Help Desk at [email protected] to request viewer access.
• The Grand Lodge is also requesting each Lodge’s Budget information, which must be conform to the Uniform Chart of Accounts.
• If Lodge budgets are changed, those changes must be sent to Adaptive Insights via email.
• The Actuals must be sent by the 3rd Friday of each month. If you are reporting for April the Actuals have to be submitted by the 3rd Friday of May
Please note the Elks FRS does not require anyone to change accounting systems, you can keep using the system you are using now.But all lodges are required use the official Elks Uniform Chart of Accounts, as documented in the May 2020 version of the Chart Of Accounts.
• Synchronize your Chart of Accounts for all accounting centers.• Conform to the Grand Lodge’s Uniform Chart of Accounts.• Sub accounts can not be 5 digit code as they are reserved for GL
Uniform Chart of accounts only• Convert to a comma separated value, before submitting to Adaptive. • Modify your current process to insure that you provide Grand Lodge
updates by the third Friday each month.
Chart of Accounts
• If using more than 1 accounting center, Review all Chart of accounts on each center to identify and document what differences currently exist. It is not necessary to combine checking accounts for this project if you are using more than 1 accounting center
• Convert all accounts to the Uniform Chart of Accounts by creating an integrated Chart of Accounts for your Lodge which conforms to the GL Uniform Chart of Accounts and works for all accounting centers.
• The Actual Monthly Activity file is used to transmit your monthly activity to Adaptive. It consists of 4 columns, with rows for every account with activity for the month:
Actual Monthly Activity File
Column Header Example Description
1 LodgeNumber 2362 The numerical lodge number2 LodgeGLAccount 30010 The local system account number3 Date 1/31/2019 The period where the activity takes
place. Use standard US date format mm/dd/yyyy
4 Amount 12587.50 Use debit – credit format, debits positive, credits negative.
• The example to the right has GL account codes and also sub accounts
• You only need to submit Accounts with activity for the period submitted but you can submit accounts with a zero balance.
• You can submit either transactional data or summary changes. The only requirement is that all activity for the month be submitted in the file. Remember all actual files are in CSV format.
• For QuickBooks Desktop users you can submit the full [Account # · Account description] string. Otherwise just submit the Account #
• Account descriptions are not read only Account Numbers
Actual Monthly Activity File
• The Actual Monthly Activity file is used to transmit your yearly budget activity to Adaptive. It consists of 5 columns, with a row for every account you plan for in the fiscal year:
Annual Budget File
Column Header Example Description
1 LodgeNumber 2362 The numerical lodge number
2 LodgeGLAccount 30010 The local system account number
3 FYE 2020 The year that the budget ends in. For the FY2019-2020 budget use 2020 for example.
4 Version Budget Right now always use Budget
5 Annual 25000 The annual amount budgeted to the account. This amount will be allocated monthly based on prior year actuals. Use positive amounts for positive values, negative amounts for negative.
The Budget file must be saved as a csv file.
Annual Budget File• The example to the right has GL
account codes and also sub accounts
• Submit the Budget file after April and May Actuals have been submitted uses the previously submitted
• If you need to adjust, you can resubmit your budget at any time. Please submit the entire budget when you do.
• If you need a copy of your Adaptive budget after you submit it please contact your State Coordinator.
• All files must be in an Excel file in a Comma Separated Values (CSV) format. This is a standard format that has universal support.
• All files must have a header row with the exact headers described here. Please use the sample files for reference.
• All file formats begin with the lodge number in the first column. It should be the simple numeric value assigned to the lodge.
• Fields with actual or budget dollar amounts in them should be formatted as numbers. No $ or commas should be included. Periods for decimals are allowed.
• Dates should be formatted as MM/DD/YYYY – 07/25/2019
File Format Guidelines
Example Data FilesActual Monthly Activity Budget - Annual
• After you have formatted and saved your files, the next step is submitting them for processing to Adaptive. This is done by emailing the CSV files to the [email protected] email address.
• Use your preferred email client to draft a new email. Attach the file. The type of file you are submitting is determined by the Email Subject. Include the following in the subject based on the file type:
• Actual Monthly Activity File – Include the word Actual
• Annual Budget File – Include the word Budget
File Submission
• In this example we’ll submit an Actual file using Gmail.
• The To address is: [email protected]
• The Subject contains the word Actual – signaling an Actual file. You can after the word Actual put your Lodge # and month of actual but Actual has to be first.
• The file Lodge 2363 Actual May19.csv is attached. Don’t forget to include your file! The file name is not critical to the import process however we recommend something that includes the lodge number, file type and date for your reference.
• When you’re ready Send the file. Within 5 minutes you’ll receive a reply with a success message or a detailed description of issues that need to be corrected
File Submission - Email
In this example we’ll submit a Budget file using Gmail.
• The To address is: [email protected]
• The Subject contains the word Budget and your Lodge # signaling a Budget file.
• The file Budget 2020 #NNNN.csv is attached. Don’t forget to include your file! The file name is not critical to the import process however we recommend something that includes the lodge number, file type and date for your reference.
• When you’re ready Send the file. Within 5 minutes you’ll receive a reply with a success message or a detailed description of issues that need to be corrected
• Ideally if your data is valid, you’ll receive a success message:
File Submission - Results
• If there was an issue with the data, you’ll receive a detailed message:
File Submission - Error
The error in this instance is the file contained an unknown Lodge GL Account. Correct the account number with a valid Grand Lodge Account Number and re-submit that before re-submitting your Actuals again.
Support
Email support at [email protected]
Remember all Actuals/Budgets are sent to
[email protected] in CSV file format
Call your State FRS Coordinator for help
